National Parks In Europe You Need To Visit

Europe has a bit of everything, and that is why a tour through Europe is a highlight among backpackers itineraries. In between the visit of cities like Paris, or old & historical cities like Prague you’ll find yourself surrounded by mountains, woods and meadows. While you don’t hear much about the national parks – in the contrary of the many things you hear about the national parks of the USA – they are definitely there. And these are the ones you need to visit!

Plitvice National Park – Croatia

Plitvice is one of the best known national parks of Europe. The picture perfect national park known for her crystal-clear lakes and waterfalls draws thousands of tourists to Croatia every year, and non of them are left disappointed!

Black Forest National Park – Germany

You should see a thousand photos of the Black Forest before truly understanding how beautiful and how diverse it is. With big trees, waterfalls, lakes and stunning hiking routes the Black Forest is a park that can take your breath away, very quickly. The Black Forest is a national park that you can easily include in every Europe trip as it is pretty centrally located in Europe, and you don’t need any special hiking gear or what so ever.

Swiss National Park – Switzerland

When visiting Switzerland you can’t get around the Swiss National Park – Even if you could I don’t think you wanted to. Swiss National Park gives you the Sound-Of-Music feeling and leaves you flabbergasted over stunning views. Standing on top of the mountains in the park gives you an amazing overview of Swiss National Park and a part of Switzerland.

Belluno Dolemite National Park – Italy

Visiting the Dolemite is a highlight on many bucket lists. while it is similar to Swiss National park, it has her own charmes. The mountains are shaped differently and have some amazing looks that leave you with picture perfect moments.

Oulanka National Park – Finland

Finland is one of my favorite countries of Europe when it comes to the nature areas, so choosing a national park of Finland is quite hard. Oulanka is a national park that marks the trip of many tourists who visit Scandinavia. In winter Oulanka is covered in a thick layer of snow. While in the short summer months Oulanka turns into a green landscape separated by the lakes that flow through it. Every month of the year – beautiful!

Vatnajökull National Park – Iceland

Iceland is a country that almost only excists out of landscapes like this but it’s Vatnajökull where it all comes together. Iced lakes, glaciers, ice caves and snowy landscapes.. you’ll know why you should visit it.

Triglav National Park – Slovenia

The tourism of Slovenia keeps growing and growing every day and national park Triglav gets more and more known across the world. No surprise – Triglav is marked by miles of green, lively woods surrounded by bald mountains. Triglav has something for everyone!

Lake District – England

I think that the picture above already tells you why the Lake District in England is included on this list. You could easily spend weeks at this piece of earth. The view you’ll have will make you fall in love with the park, even before arriving.

I am ashamed to admit that I have travelled extensively through Europe without ever visiting any of those stunning places. Thank you for the great list! It is definitely time to tackle the national parks on the Old continent 🙂